The Priscilla Project: Facilitating Equality and the Self-empowerment of At-risk Women in Healthcare Encounters

Women and minorities have consistently experienced marginalization and inequality in the United States, with low-income, immigrant and refugee women experiencing the most severe forms. This paper explores how we can restructure one area in which disparities exist, the primary healthcare system, to provide respectful, compassionate, accessible and adequate care to refugee and low-income women who are medically at-risk during pregnancy. This will be done by reviewing the Priscilla Project, an inner-city program that serves at-risk pregnant women in Buffalo, NY, including the history and persistence of disparities in healthcare, activities and impact of the program, and the uniquely contextualized program paradigm.